Thank you. Is their an easy way to build a multi
(6 to 10) Hard Drive USB/Firewire enclosure that
doesn't require a MB or an OS?

I'd love to build a simple enclosure that does what
my Mediasonic does but without the OS. I know you
need something to tell the HD's how to behave. I was
hopping their would be something embedded into a chip
so the OS could be avoided. Its a shame someone
doesn't make a kit. You supply the enclosure, power
supply, wires, etc. but they sell different RAID chip so you
can have a RAID setup. I Google for hours every
couple a' months and have always come up empty.

It looks good. What RAID configurations are you thinking of using?
If you think you may use RAID 10 (1+0) then that enclosure won't do.
If your just interested in the RAID config's it offers then you should be
all right.
Photo courteous of Buy.com

Quieter than a mouse. Its about seven
feet from my ear and I've never heard it. I've
set the fan to auto and don't worry about it.
The photos of it make it look UGLY but it isn't.
It looks pretty just not Mac brushed aluminum
pretty. I've grown to like it very much. It would
probably be cheaper/easier to buy one or two
more when they go on sale instead of building
one big 8-Bay enclosure. I just like the idea of
one big enclosure with all of my HD's instead
of daisy chaining several enclosures. Sooner
or latter I'll figure out how to build the enclosure
I want. Till then the Mediasonic is a very good
substitute._________________2011 Mac mini 2.7 GHz i7 with
16GB RAM, Samsung 512GB SSD
MacBook Pro 17" 2.5GHz
MacBook AIR 11 Inch
Mac mini, Model 1.1, 2.33 GHz C2D Proc

What I'd really like is a 4 or 5 bay unit that treats each hard drive as completely separate volumes. This way you can mix and match different hard drive sizes. If I'm not mistaken, this is called port multiplication (PM), but as far as I know, PM only works with eSATA interfaces, not FW800, with possibly one exception:

Under a strict definition you would be using eSATA for PM, however,
many RAID chips in external HD enclosure can in many cases do the
same basic thing as eSATA/PM but using a connection other than eSATA
like FW400/800 or USB.

That SpyderHub FW/USB to eSATA Converter looks intriguing. However, it seems like it would add more wires, which is kind of what I'd like to avoid.

That DAT Optic seems to do port multiplication over FW but is expensive. I do like the trayless design, however.

Re: JBOD, why do some define it as a bunch of drives concatenated or spanned into one big single hard drive, and some define it as a bunch of drives seen as completely separate individual volumes (not to be confused with partitioning)?

Thanks for all the help.

billb wrote:

asmack wrote:

Hmm... What I'd really like is a 4 or 5 bay unit that treats each hard drive as completely separate volumes.

Thats called JBOD. Many multi HD enclosures offer that configuration.

asmack wrote:

This way you can mix and match different hard drive sizes. If I'm not mistaken, this is called port multiplication (PM),

Under a strict definition you would be using eSATA for PM, however,
many RAID chips in external HD enclosure can in many cases do the
same basic thing as eSATA/PM but using a connection other than eSATA
like FW400/800 or USB.

Re: JBOD, why do some define it as a bunch of drives concatenated or spanned into one big single hard drive, and some define it as a bunch of drives seen as completely separate individual volumes (not to be confused with partitioning).

Most of this RAID stuff is expensive.
If you combine two or more drives together
in a single enclosure but recognized as being
less than the total number of drives then its
not JBOD. It would be some form of RAID.
If your drives are recognized as being separate
then its JBOD. The cheapest way to get what
you want is to buy separate single HD enclosures
and simply Daisy Chain them. Thats also, well, JBOD.
You can easily add more drives/enclosures as
needed. Thats what most people do._________________2011 Mac mini 2.7 GHz i7 with
16GB RAM, Samsung 512GB SSD
MacBook Pro 17" 2.5GHz
MacBook AIR 11 Inch
Mac mini, Model 1.1, 2.33 GHz C2D Proc

Yes, that is what I am doing now. I have three 2TB LaCie externals hooked up to the Mini (USB 2.0 only, unfortunately), which are backed up regularly via bare drives (Voyager Q dock) and SuperDuper. I rotate my backups offsite to a safety deposit box and I also backup to the cloud via CrashPlan and Zenfolio (photos only). I am supplementing all this with some optical media backup of my most critical files as well.

What I'd like to do is get rid of the three externals (as well as the spaghetti mess of wires and AC adapters that accompany them) and just have one box full of easily removable drives which behaves as though they were all individual externals. This way, I can just attach the box via one single cable to the Mini (preferably FW800 because I don't want to do the eSATA hack on the Mini and I don't want a converter), and only have one AC adapter to deal with (all 3 of my LaCie's come with these wall warts which are blocking some of the outlets on my UPS).

Oh, and it has to look nice and match the aesthetics of the Mini because I'm superficial that way.

Looks like OWC might be coming out with something I want. Maybe I'll wait and see what it's like (I'm not in a rush):

Quote:

Early next year we do have a new product line that will arrive offering an alternative to the QX2 which will allow independent drive mode. In the present – we could only go to 4 drives with RAID and non-RAID span in order to support eSATA. Next year will have full independent mode available on 4+ bay solutions that offer the quad interfaces including when connecting via eSATA.

These solutions will require matched drive for RAID modes... But we expect to officially support them for non-RAID modes when using non-matched drives as well.

Re: JBOD, why do some define it as a bunch of drives concatenated or spanned into one big single hard drive, and some define it as a bunch of drives seen as completely separate individual volumes (not to be confused with partitioning).

Most of this RAID stuff is expensive.
If you combine two or more drives together
in a single enclosure but recognized as being
less than the total number of drives then its
not JBOD. It would be some form of RAID.
If your drives are recognized as being separate
then its JBOD. The cheapest way to get what
you want is to buy separate single HD enclosures
and simply Daisy Chain them. Thats also, well, JBOD.
You can easily add more drives/enclosures as
needed. Thats what most people do.

I now use the Mediasonic with four 2TB Hitachi HD's
in RAID 10 (1+0) attached via FW400 to store my
EyeTV captures and its worked wonderfully. The
OWC's are collecting dust and I'll end up using them
randomly attached via USB. How sad, the enclosures
are beautiful to look at but just don't perform.
So, if anyone is thinking of a four-bay enclosure
I highly recommend the Mediasonic.

I thought I would update this thread before we let it die.
I'm now using the Mediasonic with an Aluminum Mac mini.
See signiture. The Mediasonic hasn't skipped a beat. Its
survived several power outages and surges (now on a UPS).
It sleeps and wakes and has never caused even one second
of stress. When I said it was built like a tank apparently it is.
I have it hooked up via FW800 to the Alumini. It was the
best $119 I ever spent. It looks like it has been replaced
with a USB-3 version. I had used it with USB-2 for a period
of time to store and play my EyeTV captures and it worked
fine, so when (if) Apple adopts USB-3 you'll be all set if you
purchase the newer USB-3 version.

I have three 2TB LaCie externals hooked up to the Mini (USB 2.0 only, unfortunately), which are backed up regularly via bare drives (Voyager Q dock) and SuperDuper.
What I'd like to do is get rid of the three externals (as well as the spaghetti mess of wires and AC adapters that accompany them) and just have one box full of easily removable drives which behaves as though they were all individual externals. This way, I can just attach the box via one single cable to the Mini (preferably FW800

Hey asmack........its only been a year. Did you get anything?
Mediasonic now has an enclosure just like mine only no RAID.
It sees all of the Drives separately. Thats what your looking
for. It has USB-3 and eSATA, no Firewire though and its not
very expensive. Heres the link for the ProBox HF2-SU3S2 sold
by Medisonic._________________2011 Mac mini 2.7 GHz i7 with
16GB RAM, Samsung 512GB SSD
MacBook Pro 17" 2.5GHz
MacBook AIR 11 Inch
Mac mini, Model 1.1, 2.33 GHz C2D Proc

Just curious : how bad is the fan noise on the Mediasonic PRORAID 4 Bay, especially when idle ?
I could not find this information on Mediasonic web site, only "3 level of speed".
I presently have a Drobo Gen2, and although it is globally very quiet, the fan sometimes starts at low speed, even when the Drobo is idle.